No survivors in vintage plane crash

Bridie Jabour

It is likely the three Brisbane couples on board a red vintage plane died on impact because the plane was ‘‘fundamentally destroyed’’ when it crashed in the Sunshine Coast hinterland, according to authorities.

Des Porter, 68, was the pilot of a De Havilland DH84 Dragon which went missing on Monday with five other people on board – Mr Porter’s wife Kath and their friends John and Carol Dawson, both 63, and Les D'evlin, 75, and his wife Janice D'evlin, 61.

‘‘It is disturbing, I personally knew the pilot, so yeah, he had a very wide group of friends and I think the antique air community are going to be quite upset that they lost him, and certainly the friends and relations of the other occupants.’’

Mr Barton said he had put his feelings aside to do his job and AMSA was coincidently poised to announce a ‘‘refocus’’ of its search on the area where the plane was found.

Before the crash site was discovered, the aviation community had almost lost all hope there would be any survivors.

As the search ramped up to 17 helicopters and one plane, the aircraft enthusiasts had been told to stop offering their services as there would be too many planes and choppers in the air, according to the organiser of the Monto Fly-In, Miles Breikreutz.

The group were travelling back from the Monto Fly-In where Mr Porter had been giving joy rides to raise money for charities.

Mr Breikreutz, also a board member for Recreational Aviation Australia, said Mr Porter was a well loved member of the aviation community which was feeling really "flat" about his disappearance.

‘‘At the moment everyone is really, really, flat. Very flat actually,’’ he said.

‘‘Our hopes are fading of finding any survivors now, especially since where they are looking now is very rugged terrain.

‘‘Our hopes are really fading altogether.’’

Volunteers on quad bikes and horse back joined the search on the ground while the Australian Maritime Safety Authority brought in more helicopters overnight.

"They’ve asked us for all of our members not to offer at the moment to go out because they’ve got too many assets like helicopters and search aircraft out there,’’ Mr Breikreutz said.

Volunteers join search on quad bikes as dam may be searched

Sunshine Coast locals Adam Wilkinson and Craig McCloud took it upon themselves to join the search for the plane, taking to the "difficult" terrain with their quad bikes.

They concentrated their search to the Imbil state forest, west of the Sunshine Coast town of Kenilworth.

Mr Wilkinson said a farmer reported seeing a plane in trouble flying over the Borumba dam on Monday.

‘‘He heard it come down through the clouds ... he said they were having engine problems,’’ he said.

Mr Wilkinson said thick foliage in the area would make any wreckage difficult to spot from the air.

The hilly, dense terrain was also inaccessible by four-wheel-drive vehicle, he said.

‘‘Pretty much, we know the forest like the back of our hand,’’ the 25-year-old mechanic from Kenilworth said.

‘‘We know a lot of the secret tracks that go down to the forest.’’

Official search parties were considering trawling a dam near where the two locals were looking for the missing plane.

An AGL Rescue Action Helicopter spokeswoman said it was possible the search could have been extended to Borumba Dam.

"We haven't made an assesment but it is something that is a possibility," she said.

"We would do it in conjunction with police."

There was also reports of locals, on horse back, conducting their own searches for the missing aircraft.

Police inundated with reports of sightings

Superintendent Terry Borland, who coordinated the search for the red De Havilland DH84 Dragon, said police had been inundated with reports of possible sightings of the plane before it went missing.

‘"We are mindful there was a lot of aicraft coming back from the Monto show so we need to be mindful of what aircraft was actually sighted and the locations of those aircraft," he said.

Superintendent Borland said although it had been a cold night in the hinterland, he hoped to find the crew today "safe and well".

‘‘We are not going to speculate about whether people are alive or not, we are sitting here looking for a plane that is currently missing and our primary objective is to find that plane,’’ he said.

The search resumed this morning with 14 helicopters and two planes.

On Monday afternoon, the Australian Maritime Safety Authority dispatched the Maroochydore-based AGL Action Rescue Helicopter to try to locate the plane and guide its landing after it let off a distress call.

Crewman Rick Harvey may have been the last to speak Mr Porter and asked him to change his radio frequency to 125.5 because their conversation was scattered.

As police remain on stand-by to be winched into the rugged terrain at any sign of the plane, the AGL Rescue Action Helicopters' chief executive warned search parties were not looking for ‘‘a big red aeroplane’’.

Instead they were looking for broken tree branches and any sign of fire.